Should You Shoot Family Formals Inside The Church or Outside? | For the MW Brides

I remember sitting on my family couch turning page after page of my parents wedding album. I made sure that none of the prints fell loose of there respectable place holders. I was absorbed seeing how young my parents were! (Because for real were my parents not always old?) And as my mom and dad smiled back up at me through the pages i was also able to see my grandparents, aunts and uncles with fewer lines on their smiling faces. Those family photos will always be treasured in our house hold because family is close to my heart. 

Years after your wedding you will be looking back on your own family photos and smiling at all those who were able to attend. So now you are trying to decide where your family photos will be? And I think it comes down to deciding if you want to be more traditional or more modern in your family formals. Let me share with you a couple of pros for both to help you decide.  

Pros for having your family photos outside. The lighting will be more natural and go better throughout your gallery. As a natural light photographer a lot of your photos will already be shot outside. Having your family formals outside will help with the over all flow of your gallery. The lighting will be more beautiful. There will not be any distracting background that your venue will have such as speakers,crosses, all that stuff you cant move off of the stage. It will be a more modern look. 

It will be enough space to host larger families.  

Doing your family portraits inside your venue is more traditional .

Pros to shooting them inside. It will be very similar to the photos that your mom and her mom have in their wedding album. You will have your venue stage show cased in your photos so you can have a little piece in your album other than the ceremony. Inside will be cooler on a hot summer day or shelter from a stormy or winter day. It will be easier for any elderly family member to sit down while they wait and easy to get to.

I personally love the more  modern look of having family formals outside when possible. I think it fits my photographic style more. 

Easter Sunday | Family Life

Easter has always been a big holiday because it celebrates the resurrection of Jesus Christ. In my mother's photo book is a picture of all of my sisters and me in matching white frilly dresses with each of us standing by age and height. To this day it is still one of my favorite photos because we look ridiculous, adorable but ridiculous. And someday I will torture my children with the same tradition.

I am so grateful that I am able to spend Easter with my with my wonderful family. Now that I am living out of the Waits household, every major holiday I am picked to make a part of the lunch meal. Due to lack of ingredients in my fridge (I know, I'm crushing this adult adulting thing) this year I went with a staple: cupcakes!! The eggs I used for the batter were a gift from a coworker's aunt's chickens in woodbury. It got me thinking, I think I would like raising chickens. Someday ;).

 I had found the cutest Easter cupcake idea on pinterest, which involved Peeps. I have never been a fan of Peeps personally, but my family's taste buds have always been a little shifted from my own. After convincing Marcus that my whole family loves peeps, I was sorely disappointed to find out that no one in my family likes peeps. Everyone was eyeing my cupcakes wearly; my family finally dove in after I let it be known no one had to eat the peeps on my cupcakes. It was my cupcake fail, but they looked and tasted great. ;)

Happy Easter!